f13.net

v1.31 Preview- huge update to include variable weather and rag doll physics (http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/index.php/component/content/article/10-production-notes/2968-v131-preview-upgrade-includes-variable-weather-and-rag-doll-physics)

Some engine additions:

v1.31 Beta- Weather Test (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hB76DZM2uFg)

v1.31 Beta- Infantry Rag Doll Effects Test (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpPIBvZEwuc)

v1.31 Beta- Effects & Terrain Objects Test (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPsMuEX4E_U)

I wonder if they still have my launch character...

How cheat ridden is this game?  I really enjoyed my early time and would consider playing again if I knew that they didn't give too much information to the client so that hacks coudl unbalance gameplay. 

Hell... does anyone play this anymore?

Not that I know first hand, but the client is extremely dumb. Has to be because all the physics are done server side (Talking about the ballistics) and I dont think they use movement prediction.

They still have a free trail going.  (https://secure.wwiionline.com/scripts/wwiionline/user/promo.jsps?joomla=true)But I am not sure this has gone live yet.

I've been debating signing up for the tutorial, not I'm wondering if it'll still be going on when this update rolls out.

Edit: Upon further inspection, these are loafers. Actually, check their forums to make sure the game will run with your current driver set. Lots of ATI issues.

The update isn't live yet AFAIK.

This is actually one of my favorite MMOs, but the engine was a bit of a sticking point.  I'd be interested in checking this out again I think.

Honestly, after WoW I considered WW2O the best MMO made.  Some of the best gaming I've ever experienced was playing this sim.  Now, that largely has to do with the squad I was in though (the 94th Armoured Brigade).  If you're new to WW2O I HIGHLY recommend getting your ducks in a row b4 you login.  It's absolutely imperative you sign up with a squad that you can identify with and perhaps learn the ORBAT.  If you roll solo you will hate it, period.  And lone wolfs are deeply frowned upon in this game, and yah... everyone will know you're unsquaded because your tag will be green.  So prepare for endless recruitment /tells.

The biggest piece of advice I can give is once you've had your fill of one type of combat, shift to another.  For instance, become a sniping master and after a few rolls of the map perhaps fly for the RAF strat. bombing group... or maybe work on your DD skills.  Once you've got a deep enough grasp of the game maybe even try for some officers/command work.  Or maybe become an instructor.

There are a million layers to this game if you're willing to dig into them.  It's been said many of the higher-ups end up quitting their jobs and playing the game full time.  Similar to EVE I guess.  But even a lowly foot soldier can effect the game pretty deeply, to the point of ingame recognition (stat. tracking is pretty robust).  There's a point where you dont even have to really play to effect the game. (command)

I could go on and on.  Overall, it's a deeply rewarding game if you stick with it for at least a few months.
Frankly, the only reason I stopped playing is because I just got tired of the same map.  It's still the European theatre even though years back they promised an African theatre and a Pacific theatre.  They have yet to deliver on that.

Interesting. I have played off and on since release, but pretty much quit after BF2 came out and I got my FPS jollies from that. Does it still take fucking forever to get into a decent fight? Is defending bases still an exercise in rape survival? Is the infantry game any where near as compelling as <insert name of modern FPS>?

Well, just b4 I stopped playing they added paratroopers and changed the way you supply bases.  You cant back-supply (as much) anymore so attacking with overwhelming forces isnt as possible as it was originally.  I believe the rear supply is also much more limited unless command shifts resources around.  It isnt as cut and dry as it was and now more than ever the "Quartermastering" squads are really important.  I remember many battles having to be much more multi-faceted instead of just a tank zerg from over-supplied ABs.  So you'd need air supp., paratroopers, inf., and armor together or it was a lot harder to rape bases.  Which is good imo.  It also extended maps and kept them from getting rolled too easily.  (the ol' afternoon Euro swarm that takes 8 towns was effectively done in)

The only other FPS I've thought was close to as good as WW2O was Arma(2).  Everything else is an arcadey joke to me.... if you're talking "compelling."
There's a difference between shear fun and compelling.  Compelling FPS's require some blood, sweat, and tears to get to the fun.  Resupplying tanks for 2 hours only to get raped by a Stuka during an offensive action sux, but it does indeed make for tense gameplay.

There are very few stories to tell playing shyt like BF2 or Crysis, etc.  But play WW2O for a while and you'll have some stories guaranteed.  And tellin those stories is a good way to pass the time while you fly a few hours doing Bomber deliveries   :grin:    (I do believe they added an autopilot btw)

I'm referring to the current version.

I'll second Ghambit. I had a friend who was a realism fanatic and loved WW2O, so much so that he paid for a second account just to get me to play. We had some good times in that game and I still recall doing a half hour Opal run with a squad to take a town right behind the frontline. This was before the AI town defense, so it was easy as pie and a good time watching the attackers get rolled from behind. We even drove our opals all the way back.

God I hated driving Opals.

Opals made nice targets.  Laffly's ftw.
geez Nix, if you played before they even had AI, that was well before even MY time.  Jesus, the game barely even worked back then.  That had to be back in 01-02 maybe?  I remember doing screening actions in a truck with the 2nd best rifleman in the game.  "Omoto" I think his name was.  The two of us would run around skirmishing FBs and towns to draw nme assets away from the main thrust - those were good times and every now and then you felt the weight of the entire game on your shoulders (many times HQ pops in and demands progress reports, etc.).  Strat. bombing runs against factories had me phuckin sweating.  I could go on and on with all kinds of stories.

In checking the Wiki seems as if the Chinese govt. has contracted the Rats for a Chinese version of the game.  That's good news because they get new capital, but it seems that the past few years have had delayed development because of it.  (explains why the african theatre never started)

Another interesting tidbit, the U.S. military often used WW2O for strat./tactics training.  Dunno if they still do.  Nowadays they probably use custom scenarios using VBS or Arma.

Yeah, it was awhile ago. The worst part was my computer could barely run the game at the time cause I had a really shitty computer, so for fun he would grab his flight stick, I would be gunner and we'd see if I could shoot anything with my abysmal ~10 FPS. Those were some good times, I definitely loved stuka bombing with that FPS, if I successfully bombed something my squad would go nuts because I probably had a 1/1000000 chance of ever getting it without crashing.

I also remember when AI first went in and we tried an Opal run. The AI originally had pinpoint accuracy and could shoot you from a KM or two away.

The news was surprising to me, I hadn't expected rag-doll physics, blood splotches and rain. Also nicer trees and cover.

Big cities like Antwerp are going to lose the death-star like trench runs and every building will be individual (though you won't be able to enter all of them). Capturing depots just means you need to be IN the depot, the more friendlies inside the faster it goes, and all enemy infantry need to be eliminated first, which adds some gameplay bonus (as does the weather making the air-to-mud bombing more...interesting).

I remember you being very big on WW2O at one point, Comstar. You ever sub up or is it all EVE now?

Wait wait wait.  Comstar is THE Comstar from WW2O??  Seriously?  (ur like... famous n' stuff)
If so, nice to see you dude!  I was "Blkhawke" or "Blackhawke" from the Allied 94thAB (now defunct).  We used to have some good times eh?

I still play WW2OL from time to time, my account has always been active since Feb 2001.  Mostly I play Eve though. That will probably change with the patch for awhile too. I still need to see the changes Docdoom made to a lot of the old towns, I hear St Trudien'a west depot got a lot of building's added around it.

You've got a lifetime sub dont you?
What squad are you in?  I've been thinking about resubbing.  They've still got my soldier even.

I *should* have gotten a liftetime sub by now, I just pay for a yearly account (who would imagine WW2OL was still going for 8 years, and some of the code was written in the 20th century!).  I'm still in the ANZAC squad, which is still going strong so I hear from Rabbitlldr (He's still playing, and still playing in/helping run the RN).

Does Planetside get updates any more or is just in a maintenance mode? Hell, the only 3 MMFPS's I can think of are WW2OL, PS and (soon) Dust514 for eve on the console, and there arn't any MMSim's except WW2OL either.

There's a Chinese version of PlanetSide called Welkin4591 that I think is in closed beta. Other MMOFPSs at this point probably include games like Huxley, Global Agenda and APB, but they aren't released yet.

You just know someone would bring this up ...

TAXI TO VICTORY! (http://wiki.onlinegamers.org/index.php?title=TAXI_TO_VICTORY%21)  :why_so_serious:

Wow.  ANZACs are still going; that's pretty impressive.  Allied this whole time?
And Rabbit is still there.... another legend.  (sigh)  aw man those were the days.  I remember kickin ass and taking names with both you guys.  Small world.

Is there ANY talk about changing the campaign map??  Sorry, I dont have the energy to sift through the forums.
I'm so tempted to re-sub but that game eats your soul like no other if you give it the chance.

Wow, a few names I recognize from a long time ago.
I played for a few years after the release of the game under the name 'Alucard'.  Played with the 1stFJ, then JG2.

I've always said that if the Ww2online devs would put as much love into the infantry combat as they do the air combat, that the game would be much more attractive to the masses.

When is this update suppose to go live?

You the same Alucard from MxO? (mxoai.com)

Fuck that shit.

Also, I'm not a fan of the "b4".

Alrighty then, but dont come cryin when the learning curve messes with your fun.

Ahh, Life is but an abbreviation of reality.

Well... you got me with that one.  Good show.

No.  Wwiionline was the only game I used that name.

No, same map. It's described as the Unity 1.5 engine. Unity 2.0 will be the big terrain-everything-is-automated-wonder.  So the battle of France, which has now lasted for twice as long as the entire war, continues. It's the MMOG version of 'Allo 'Allo.

No release date as yet, it's in closed beta as of now. They'll be an open beta (subscribers only, so not in the more traditional open beta to everyone open beta). My guess is a month or more at least before it's officially released.

What do you mean by "big terrain-everything-is-automated-wonder?"  The map will push itself slowly?
Anyways, I really like these changes... the biggest of which imo is Shader 3.0 stuff.  Although niggling things like verifying a kill will be much easier with "rag doll."  The weather stuff looks like a pilot's dream/nightmare.  Will the AAA-AI be able to pick off planes even though they're above the cloud-deck? (might be nice to loiter over a town this way) 

I'm gonna also assume the weather thing was finally added so that you dont have the unit limitation air assets seem to cause.  In the olden days many times you never saw a swarm of planes until they were right on top of you or you'd just see them fleetingly or not at all (until the bomb exploded on your head).  At least with the weather there's a graphical "cut-off" to only allow assets below the deck to be rendered (one would hope; works well with the new object instancing).  Nice trick/fix if it indeed does this.  Also helps the air quake to be more fluid above the cloud-deck, w/o performance issues caused by irrelevent ground assets.

There were some "Exclusive screens" in the recent news letter:

(http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/images/stories/axiscolumn7.jpg)

(http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/images/stories/ragdoll3.jpg)

Not to shabby.

There's fun in WWII Online?  When did they patch that in?

Also: http://twitter.com/j_smedley

Are they naming everything 'Next'?  What are the games following those?  X Next Next?

That has to be a lie, SOE doesn't care about Planetside 2, it would be to awesome if done right. They don't do awesome, or done right.

Second screen shot. That guy flying on the right is awesome. :awesome_for_real:

Someone talk me out of playing this.  I'm one of the idiots that rebuilt an entire box to get double digit framerates at release.  This was the game I wanted desperately to succeed. 

Wait until the patch to try it out.  If they dont have a lengthy free trial I'm sure they'll add one then.  I wouldnt get involved until then just for the fact that there will be much more of a playerbase once the patch goes live, and that translates into more fun. 

Why talk you out of it?  Its actually a good game, and a lot of fun.  The downsides:  its "slow" compared to most FPS games, you can spent 10 minutes running to your position, then get killed in 1 shot.  Other than that, its World War II....Online...

More a "sim" than an "fps"

Anyway, I'll be going back to check it out again after this patch hits.

I was a HUGE fan of BF1942 but wanted it to have more sim elements.  I think this may be my game, but want to check it out before committing. 

I'm actually interested in Rise of Flight as well, but have some reservations. 

I think there is currently a 2 week free trial.   It requires a credit card though, if I recall correctly, so if you don't want to get charged after your second week, you have to remember to cancel.

There is a link to the free trial on the main page.  www.battlegroundeurope.com

Again, dont even try this game w/o being pre-selected into a squad - like ANZACS (if you're allied).  So save yourself some free trial time, hit their website, sign up, and then login your 1st day.  You will wtf/quit otherwise.

I played the game for two months at release as a squadless solo.  If I can endure two months of that, it HAS to be better now.  Right?

Isn't calling it Battleground Europe a little redundant since the war kinda happened in Europe?

Their plan was to branch out to other theaters, such as 'Battleground' North Africa.
Man, I wish that had happened.

"Green tags" are hated people.  You guys run around willy nilly stealing resources and messing up ops.
Also, there's a lot more in the game than at release...  lot more to digest.  Impossible to do solo unless you've got serious patience.

I have serious patience.  I also know how to enjoy myself without ruining fun for others.  If I can find a squad of people that don't make me want to shove a pair of scissors in my ear, I'll join them.  Otherwise, they're all free to hate me. 

It's a game.  Seriously. 

It's a sim.  Green tags mess up their sim-iness.

With this new info, we should make an entire squad of green tags.

Im down with doing this.

He is right though, some of the best (and least frustrating by far) times I have had with this game was when I jumped into a squad and join the vent server. It does make all the difference.

Maybe some of the more long time players on F13 can herd the horde of green tags. I am sure we can cause at least a distraction as nothing but green tags descend on the target.

If they have the Chinese money rolling in they need to floor the accelerator!  Fill in the missing tanks quickly with statistical damage models, then come back later and do the detail models.  Make basic infantry free to play so the ratio of infantry to tanks and heavy weapons is correct. This also exposes greater numbers of players to the game.   Work on North Africa so you can get the Americans involved in the game instead of the half-assed French/American side you have now.

1.31 went live a few days ago. 


If you can score a free trial, now's the time to give the game a try.  I assume this 1st campaign (which evidently started with a beachhead breakout), will be one of the best in years simply due to number of players.
I'm gonna try to get in-game, but I have serious time constraints.

Ok, I'm to lazy too read this thread, or any other info about the state of the game other than it got a major upgrade.  I purchased this game on release, and was right there along with Lum in the beginning trying to figure out which function key made my plane turn left on the first day (along with the flying tanks and horrible bugs/crashs).  Despite all that shit, I still kind of enjoyed the game and payed it for awhile in all its hardcore sim buggy glory.  Explain to me in a few sentences what's changed since then and why I should play.  Go!

Better graphics- including infantry ragdolls with blood splatters, rain and dramatic explosions. The cities are now full of individual buildings and no longer just big blocks.

Player made video from Allied side (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pboDIyo2qHA&feature=player_embedded) and the same battle from the axis side (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfoCm6i-7XI)


(sorry for the size of the pics, I don't know how to make them smaller)

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OOsbJR9OgS0/TBB9ug6myBI/AAAAAAAAAco/phNTz1I4T_E/s1600/th_SShot17.jpg)

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OOsbJR9OgS0/TBB9AIXs-nI/AAAAAAAAAcY/iMHvKxi2q9Y/s1600/th_SShot19.jpg)

(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OOsbJR9OgS0/TBB9D4azhbI/AAAAAAAAAcg/pJCUeB1P4iA/s1600/th_SShot20.jpg)

(http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OOsbJR9OgS0/TA8IVamXdfI/AAAAAAAAAcI/DvjCMeMEpk0/s1600/th_SShot14.jpg)

(http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OOsbJR9OgS0/TA8IQhjbo2I/AAAAAAAAAb4/2pOnDAlmdBM/s1600/th_SShot12.jpg)

Flag capturing is now based on the amount of people inside a flag depot - the more people, the faster it is. Moleing is a easy thing to counter.  


If you haven't played in a long time- Tigers, Churchill's, later war Sherman's. The HC players move brigades and divisions around like a operational wargame. Trucks can deploy mobile spawn points within 500 to 1500m of a town. Units have limited amounts of units before they suffer attrition and have to be pulled out. Mortors firing smoke and HE barrages. Paratroops and Snipers. Destroyers and Transports. A working help system and training tutorial.  

New campaign after the shakedown from the patch starts tomorrow.

I'm resubbing for this, as was my plan when I took a break from the game last autumn.  Looking forward to getting back into it.  For all the complaints people have about this game (mainly the inaccessibility), if you are willing to put the time in to learning I still think its one of the best MMOGs on the market. 

Its odd really, its a game I love myself, but a game I would suggest to almost no one.  I'd suggest the free trial to anyone who is REALLY interested, but its unfortunate that you almost can't learn enough in the 2 week trial to really find out if you are going to want to play longer term.  The free trial plus the first month (20 bucks I think), is probably enough though.

The ground and building textures are somewhat cringe worthy.  The only way I could imagine them worse is a poster of Hitler in a thong bikini.

Anisotropic filtering might help a tad.

*shrugs* The game is good enough to more than make up for dated graphics, especially since there is nothing similar on the market.

Wait, why are there Tigers and later iterations of the Sherman if they never took Paris?  :ye_gods:

Those pics were horrible (in-game the feel is completely different).  FWIW you CAN ramp up the graphics quite a bit, but most folks dont do that because of performance.  Even in this day and age to do what WW2O does you have to cut corners.

Typically infantry will use high-end graphics, navy even higher, and the RAF/Luft. has to dumb theirs down.

Quite impressive given the nature of the game. I am tempted to give it a go, however the thing that allways turns me off of this game is that you spawn as a vehicle, and its combat model with the guns. Still though, thats just a style thing for me, I know many don't care.

That is unbelievably fugly.

Is this one of those games that turns into a massive time sink in order to get any enjoyment out of it?

If i may, a point of refrence may be in order.

Behold!

(http://www.hq.wwiionline.com/screenshots/31401-3.jpg)

That is correct, yes old buildings were simply boxes with transparencies and wall thickness was not.

(http://www.hq.wwiionline.com/screenshots/brit1.jpg)

Thats right! That what you looked like before.

(http://www.hq.wwiionline.com/screenshots/31301-1.jpg)

Yummy terrain!

While the game may not be modern warfare, for its game play (entire Euro landmass seamless), and feature set, this last update to the graphics is quite simply, amazing in perspective.

(http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/images/stories/axiscolumn7.jpg)

This title has come a long way, and still has more real world physics than it should. lol.

Complaining about the graphics for this game (especially post 1.31) is really quite pretentious.  Graphics are fine given the design as a whole.
Matter of fact, I prefer them this way rather than stylized and if they werent stylized they'd be overtly photoreal (like Arma or something) and the game would break down.

You tend to forget about the graphics when doing stuff like precision paratrooper drops on hot FBs... or when a salvo of torps. is inbound on your destr.  Or you're getting overran and about to lose Antwerp.  Or you're dodging flak in a bomber on a group strat. run to a factory, whilst getting swarmed by 109s.  Or you're desperately shifting resources and manpower in HQ and/or on TS.  Or or or... could go on and on.

'Course none of this "fun" matters when there's not enough playerbase or the campaigns start getting stale.

For what it is the graphics are well beyond the need of the game.  I'd say that the graphics were fine and the upgrade goes beyond what most of the players expected.  If I had a regular group of people to run a squad with, I'd definitely be playing this game often.  Funny... that's the exact thing I say about most MMO's.   :why_so_serious:

Yeah, some of my best gaming moments have come out of this game, graphics or not. 

Speaking of which, just played some.  1.31 hasn't changed too much  mechanically, just the capture mechanic (no more table humping!).  Had great fun and jumped right back in with the old squad defending a city.  1 infantry and 2 gun kills on my first sortie back,  :grin:

If you're good, no. Naturally, everyone who ever plays a PvP game thinks themselves as a "good pvper".
 

You start as a riflemen/crappy tank/low plane.

However, seeing as a riflemen can kill any other infantryman and is just as useful as capturing a flag than any other, a crappy tank can still kill every infantry/ATG/AAA gun/truck, and a low level plane can still dive on a hostile and get on their 6 in the right situation, it's not as bad it sounds like. Sure having a SMG or LMG is more useful when defending at a range of 10m, but in the countryside the rifle is much better. About the only thing you can't do at low level is kill tanks with infantry, but you can spawn low level ATGs that can kill any tank from the flank or rear if you're close enough or a AA gun that can kill any aircraft or infantry.

For that matter, the Low level fighter for the RAF- The Hurricane, is a MUCH better noob ride that the more advanced Spitfire in some ways - you might be slower, but the gun platform is more steady, and you can go around in a tighter circle at lower speeds.

As the campaign goes on into higher "tiers" of units, the noob rides get better. So after a week or two of the map starting, the noob ride becomes a Spitfire Mk I, then II, then V. Sure the guys with more time in the game can still fly better ones, but those better ones also get used faster and there are less of them- the noob will still be able to get a unit from the spawn list after the vet has lost all the expensive equipment and is reduced to flying the same thing.

The biggest hurdle is YOUR experience. There are people flying those fighters who have been flying online flight sims for longer than some Team Fortress II players have been alive. Then again, that includes people like me, who are still crap. And if you happy to take it slow and work with someone as a team mate/wingman/buddy you can do a lot more than the solo guy who has no one watching his back. Also, on the ground where everyone can be shot at by everything, experience dosn't help much if someone throws a grenade into your room or a riflemen 400m away just waiting for you to pop your head up.

This, basically.  You don't need to play all the time, but there IS a brutal learning curve.  You don't fall behind in levels or loot or anything like that by not playing for a long stretch, and even as someone who can spawn in as any infantry, I still choose my trusty rifleman more often than not. (There are some strategic level things going on that newbs need to pay 0 attention to that determine how many of any given unit can spawn in to a certain town, but you really don't need to learn about all that straight up, since its handled by experienced players).

I don't think I even got a single kill the first week I played this game, but I was hooked none the less, if that gives any indication.

You get yelled at as a newb if you waste important materiel.  So it's always advisable to run training scenarios first, then start using up equipment.
If you're not well taken care of by a good squad, you can always run re-sup missions too.  I remember back when there was an entire squad (headed up by some nice lady) called the "quartermasters" who's sole purpose was to forward deploy equipment.

I believe this mechanic somewhat changed though after a big patch a few years ago.  I'm not sure how supply works anymore (that's about when I quit playing).  I BELIEVE you can deploy equipment to a frontline, but any rear equipment gets lost if oversupped?  Malakili??  How does this work?

Yeah, thats more or less it.  Granted, running supply like that is kind of boring to be fair, and probably not something that is going to make new players real interested in playing more.  Something squads tend to do to move some supply around for particular ops that have in the works more than something that is consistently done at most towns/bases these days.

You have ether played to much, or have served.  :grin:

If a rear-base gets emptied to oversupply a frontline base, can you resupply the rear base normally?  (just not oversup it?)
And I beg to differ about supply runs.  I had fond memories of running big iron (bombers, etc.) supply with quite a few characters (a lot of these guys are vets in real life as you know).  It's the one time when you can kinda relax, do some planning, shoot the shit, etc. and actually get something productive done - rather than just stand around.

Which is a note to everyone interested:  this is not the game you just pop in casually and shoot stuff and leave (you CAN, but you wont be that effective).  It's more like planning a big Raid in your typical Diku.

Ugh, accidentally navigated away and lost what I had typed up. 

Long story short, if you are interested in finding out more about the nitty gritty before trying the game out, check out the wiki
http://wiki.wwiionline.com/index.php/Main_Page and of course feel free to ask questions here.

 :ye_gods:

hmm?

Forgot how grognard it was.

Also, the map here: http://www.lagus.org/webmap/ is easily much better than the one on the battlegroundeurope.com website.   Shows recent activity, supply lines, where armies are located, and the like.

So, yeah. Created a trial account and tried to get it running on my old laptop (pentium M 1.6 ghz, geforce go 6800, 2 gigs of ram). Doesn't even meet the system requirements, but at least the game booted.... ish.

(http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/7293/wwiionlinebug.th.jpg) (http://img7.imageshack.us/i/wwiionlinebug.jpg/)

I think I'll give it another whirl after my vacation when I've once again got access to my desktop gaming rig. :P

 :ye_gods:

Managed to actually get ingame, but alas, everything was too distorted and slow to actually do anything but (after some effort) completing the basic movement tutorial.

I feel like I'm being trolled via wiki.

Is there any way to get a friend invite and apply it to an existing acct?  I'd really like to try the 1.31 patch live, but I'm not gonna pay $15 to do it. 
Starting a new acct. doesnt appeal to me, 'cause I'm relegated to crap equipment and I'd prefer not having to give out a bunch more billing info.

Why dont they have a "returning vets" promotion like they usually do?

I think they did last weekend(ish, I don't remember the exact date). 1.31 was live at that point, but it wasn't a normal campaign, they were running another event to test it on the live servers or something.

I'll see if there are any promotions I can do.

Doesn't seem like there is something like what you are looking for Ghambit.

On the plus side, campaign 62 has gotten off to an absolutely fantastic start. There was an incredible battle last night at Dinant that went on for hours that was among the best battles I've seen in the game.  The terrain in that area can lead to some epic battles, and that was certainly one of them.

Well, I 'spose I could just fire up an alt account to try it out.
I remember back when I played that battles could last an entire evening and into the next morning... then one could stay on and fight the Euros and Aussies.  Places like Antwerp typically.

Yeah, the big city fights can go on for days really, and if you consider the fact that the surrounding towns are really part of the same battle, it can get pretty epic around those major choke points.   I'd really suggest giving it a shot, even if on an alt account.  You'll be playing lots of rifleman, but frankly, I spawn as that the majority of the time anyway.

Just wanted to throw a quick review together of patch 1.31 for anyone who cares (not that many people probably do, but humor me).

Gameplay: Basically the same as it ever was.  Still very much a sim, and a lot of the game is pretty cryptic/not transparent to beginners.  That being said, it is fairly easy to spawn in as a rifle man at a random town and have an idea about what to do.  The biggest change to gameplay in the patch 1.31 is the capture mechanics.  No more one person capping a table, instead the are more fluid like more modern games.  The speed at which you cap is determined by how many people are inside the objective.  Long story short, I'm seeing a lot more teams of infantry moving around cities and towns together because their combined capping power is significant, whereas before you really only needed one person to "ninja" an objective.  Now it takes a single person 8 minutes to capture if they are by themselves, so its not so viable a strategy anymore.  

Edit: ** I should add, for people that are still in the "Taxi to Victory" mentality about this game, it, while classic, doesn't really accurately represent getting into the game at all anymore. Sure, flying is very much like a flight sim, and therefore is quite tricky, but with nothing but a mouse and keyboard you can easily play infantry, armor, and navy, and be able to pick it all up pretty quickly by doing nothing more than looking over the keybindings.

Graphics: Definitely a nice upgrade, certainly not cutting edge, but given the fact that you've got bigger battles in this game than in any other I've seen save perhaps EVE (and probably including EVE occasionally), and that you've got a massive view distance, realistic sky, and a million other things going on, it all works pretty well.   New weather effects add some neat situations to the game, I've seen in rain twice so far, and it makes the fighting interesting, visibility is decreased, and the cloud cover makes it a little more difficult for air.  Compared to what it was, its a lot better, but that isn't saying much.  A fair amount of new models for buildings in the game, most noticeably for Army Bases/Bunkers, which now look and function a lot nicer.

Sound: Same sounds, exceptionally good as always.

Summary: The best PvP MMO I've played, is ...still...the best PvP MMO I've played.  Not the easiest to get into, but once you are into it, still provides some of the best gaming moments out there.  Tonight I was part of a few attacks and defenses, and had an absolute blast.  There really isn't anything like setting up an attack on a town with a huge column of armor, ATGs set up on a hill shelling the town, and infantry streaming in while air support buzzes overhead.  The sheer experience of it is fantastic, and still hasn't gotten old as far as I'm concerned.

I'll be happy to answer any questions if anyone has any.

I had played quite a bit before I had to come up north to work.  Havent been online for a week or so and I gotta say I miss it. 
The main difference to me from 2005 was that it seems like more units are visible at a time and the game runs smoother.  In the old days, typically you'd be cutoff from seeing the air quake from the ground...  but now, you can see pretty much every plane in the sky, unless weather says otherwise.  Whether this is because there's no more 100 unit graphical cap or that there's just not as many players... I'm not sure of.

Tbh though, battles nowadays arent as populated as the old days.  And in this regard, things feel a lot more casual.  Indeed, the learning curve in the old game was even worse - BUT, the sim feel was greater.  Today's version of the game is definitely more fat-trimmed and casually oriented.  The squads are also less regimental and less VOIP dependent it seems.

It's definitely a different game.  Less epic, but less clunky and ugly.  The new capture mechanics along with the AO and supply changes from the last huge patch were all really designed to consolidate the playerbase, which was a smart move.  It'd be interesting to see what'd happen if we had population numbers from 5+ years ago, which is why everyone wants a new game using the same premise. 

Yeah, I really wasn't sure how long it has been since you played, so now its clear to me that a lot of the changes that came a good ways prior to the big 1.31 patch are new to you as well.   So, if you haven't played since release or in a bunch of years, yeah, 1.31 is a different game in a major way (still more a sim than much else on the market, but certainly not Taxi to Victory).  But it isn't a huge change from 1.30.   The changes they made to make the game work with a smaller pop had the side effect of making it more accessible because its more obvious whats going, even if you aren't "in" on the planning and so forth. 

Do they have more robust stat-tracking now? In the olden days when I played there was some 3rd party thing hacked together, but it was really a pain in the ass to use.

http://csr.wwiionline.com/scripts/services/index.jsp

Ah that is much better. Even has some of my stats from the olden days. I though my K/D ratio was better, but oh well. I played almost exclusively infantry, so I got mowed down my armor A LOT. I might have to check things out next time they have a free veteran weekend or some such.

I  always wanted to try  ,  but never happened , trial requires credit card  # - so screw it . I also checked online stats - there is like 5-10 players playing it . meeeeehhhh.


They need to go F2p and start doing microtransactions. With no players in it I dont see it being attractive. The conquest map combined with combined arms gameplay seems like kick ass idea though. I would definitely plays something like this provided it had  players .heck I dont even care about graphics if it has massive battles (100 -200)

It does have massive battles, though if you aren't in Europe or the US, then your prime time might not have battles that big.   The worst thing this game could do is go F2P with microtransactions, what would they sell?  There is no gear or items.   Sorry if you aren't willing to try it because the trial requires a credit card, your loss if you are serious about wanting a game like this.

If they could better limit the supply of tanks and planes, I'd be all over this game.  Has any kind of attrition mechanism been added such that you can run out of tanks/planes in an area for some set period of time?  I love to play infantry and want dedicated infantry battles (a la real time squad leader).  If this game could give me that, I'd be all over it. 

There IS fun to be had during off-peak hours, especially if you take the plunge into command.  You can run supply, do strat. bombing, naval bombardments, training, planning, blow FBs, and if you're really slick and organized setup an AO and sneak cap a small town with a well organized squad.  Even if you dont have command authority, if you at least get to know the officers often you can get them to lay an order for you even if they're not online.  (e.g. commanders dont get much sleep)

It's not a cut and dry on/off peak type of game.  Things DO happen during the quiet times, just like in real war.


Indeed, the whole game is really a battle of attrition.  Whoever attrits the other side the best and is the most patient, wins.  Example, I was in a large battle over large town near an airfield.  In order to take it we had to attrit them of planes or "game over."  We positioned DOZENS of AAA and ATG in the high hills and snuck some armor close in on their airfield. It took a while, but eventually they ran out of supply and we could move in our main armor columns and inf.  The key here is using low cost equipemnt to take out high cost stuff... like ATRs for tanks, or AAA for planes, etc.  OR, simply having a positive K/D

Microtransaction could be easily added. Like award resources, new guns ,planes , perks etc- check any other microtransaction based shooter to get ideas.

Credit card for trial is a turn off , but the biggest one was the battle stats.  - It seems like there are a dozen people playing it at any one time l! - if its less than 64 people online in same battle -no thanks, that is deserted dead for my taste.  I already have BC2 and only thing it lacks is persistence and scale.

The only things that have ever really turned me off of this game is the shooting style, the fact that you are your tank (Ilove plantisdes getting in and out of things system) and the fact that 4 pixels killed me. ( green on green + distance means that sniper is 4 pixels in your view).

Yeah, the gameplay is definitely not for everyone, planetside its not.  Very slow and deliberate, and the majority of your deaths will come from something you never saw.  The way to get around that is by sharing information with people in your mission/target and doing your best to stay hidden, use smoke when running across open areas, or getting enemy positions suppressed with machine gun / HE fire.



I have no idea what you are talking about with a dozen people playing at once, I was on earlier during Australian prime time (the least populated time of the day by far) and the battle I spawned into was easily at least 64 people, and not to mention the server has been up and down today for maintenance.  Wherever you are getting your stats is just plain wrong.

 Basically your microtransactions idea would totally demolish the existing playerbase who would be outraged at the change, and most new players wouldn't stick with the game past a day or two because of the steep learning curve.  Brilliant ideas all around.

You can switch positions in your tank as well as your plane.  If you're inf. you can also hitch a ride and get on and off.  If you're driving an MSP, you can lay it down and simply get out.
So, it's KINDA like PS but usually only when you're hitching a ride or are providing a mobile spawn.

As for "pixel deaths,"  the best infantry players all use a magnifying glass and variable freq. mice.

Do you get the binoculars on creation now?

Anyway, my complaint is mostly that I may be to accustomed to indicators, and level and player styling that is not intended to make you simply blend in (with exception of very overt mechanics, like, cloaking).

I can't pick out a 4 pixel blob player from the rest of the background, so hitting it, or even knowing that thats not a tuff of grass before being sniped is kind of a problem for me.

Its me, not you (WWIIO) :)

As far as vehicles, they really need to add getting in and out animations. I don't like games where you just spawn as "X". Personal preference. I do recall sitting on tanks and such, but then came the 4 pixels.  :grin: Then a VOIP from me: "Uh, what just happened?"


Maybe thats not an issue anymore with the graphics update.

The way supply works it would be pretty difficult to deal with getting in and out of vehicles/using them. For instance, you spawn as a tank and that starts the tank building ticker.  If you get out of that tank, whats the status?  The tank is still on the field, but now are you a rifleman? Does that get subtracted from supply?  Its also somewhat unrealistic that a tank crew would just hope out of a tank guns blazing.  There are, of course, transports for moving infantry (trucks, planes and boats), but thats not really what you are talking about of course, you're talking about the driver being able to get out.

You do get binoculars right away now as far as I know, it used to be rank 3 or so. 

As for blending in, you learn to look for movement and muzzle flashes.  Its not so much that you see a german in that bush, you just see something move and shoot into it.   If it isn't for you, it isn't for you, no problem there, just trying to explain to you how I go about spotting enemies.

Everyone should already be a rifleman. If a tank gets pulled from the depo, its taken from the depo.

As far as the rest, tanks should be pulled from depo and climbed into. Not spawned in as. Thats all I am saying. I am not talking about jumping out instantly out of a tank. Planetside did a great job of animating getting in and out of a vehicle in a somewhat believable way. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQ62XBepML8)

I also do not like games where you "pop" in and out of things.

I didn't mean the animatons would look odd, though yes, that would also be no good.    What I meant was it doesn't make sense that any random rifleman knows how to drive a tank, or shoot its guns properly, etc.  As it stands, when you spawn into a tank (or other vehicle) it has its entire crew inside (each of which can be independently killed), while you can switch to any member of the crew using the F keys (or have your friends join your vehicle and you can each man part of it), so when you are spawning a tank you aren't just spawning the piece of armor, you are in effect spawning and controlling the entire crew.

Now, I realize that modern FPS games, even the ones that tout "realism" don't generally take into account that kind of thing and it can feel a bit dated to have the game function the way it does.  But it has an sort of consistent internal logic that works.  Also, yeah no amount of explaining the reasoning is going to change your mind if you just plain don't like the mechanics.

I don't like being a tank, I also don't really like space games where I am just a ship. It is a personal preference. I like the troop plans, and the trucks, and sitting on tanks and such.

The other issue with the tank stuff as Bworth wants it is simply stat. tracking.  When you choose to pilot a tank, you're a tanker... and your stats will track as such.  If you get out and what not, then how do you track said stats?  Also, it'd bork the supply chain and resource allocation, not to mention totally throw off the numbers.

Anyways, none of it really matters because it's really a small subset of the game.  There's nothing stopping you from doing a multitude of other things.

I never played long enough to really care about any of that. That's all end game top tier stuff, something a noob will likely never care about, not when hes in the "just figure out how to kill things and get some kills" stage. All I know is I pulled a tank, and could not get out, I ended up getting stuck in some ditch and sat there until something killed me (long time ago).

I'm just stating the things that stop me from playing the game, its all personal preference, its not a knock on the game, I find it impressive. Always have.

I think i have even started a thread or two about it  :oh_i_see:

I didn't play at release, so I can't say for sure how it was then, but nowadays if something happens to you in a vehicle you can despawn instead of waiting for someone to come along and gank you.

You've always had the ability to despawn, so dunno why he'd sit inside his tank waiting to be killed.  All you're doing is giving the xp to the enemy and shorting your own supply, assuming you're close enough to get an RTB or Rescue.

Speaking of which, a useful tactic is making sure you're within your town's RTB-radius so if you get damaged whilst defending you can just despawn and start over.

with world of tanks being awesome why would anyone play this again?

Thats just a silly thing to say.

Because you like to troll MMO threads.

Obvious troll is obvious.


You bastards gotta quit bumping this thread- it is making me antsy to play again, and I have neither the time nor the budget to cram another subscription game in. I really need to be independently wealthy so I can come even close to playing all the games I want. This whole working thing is bullshit.

New features in the works already after the big patch

Next up: placeable objects:

http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/index.php/component/content/article/17-development-notes/6523-player-placed-objects-in-the-works

(http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/images/stories/wwiiol_misc/mspobject.jpg)

If a few people want to get together and form a squad to mess with this game, I'd go back in a heartbeat. 

On a related note, anyone interested in giving Rise of Flight (http://riseofflight.com/en/about/features) a try with me?

I am a member of a squad that will surely accept anyone here who wants to come back and try the game for a bit.  A well respected and productive squad in the game right now and a friendly environment.  Only potential problem for people depending on how you feel:  Allied only play during campaigns, playing axis is grounds for dismissal except during intermission.

Ghambit already joined, though I haven't seen him on in a bit (I think he went out of town on business or something though).  If you are interested, www.13inf.com.   I don't mean this to be shameless advertising or anything like that, just want you guys to know that you won't be on your own if you want to give the game a shot again.  If people are interested I'll start a thread on our forums about it.

Perfect! I think I have played a total of about an hour as Axis, mostly to play with the 88. Allied 4 Lyfe, yo.

Was part of a great op last night.  Well over 100 people coordinated to sneak into an axis city and capture its army bases simultaneously, bouncing all their brigades, and allowing the rest of the allies to roll in an cap the city after a bit of a counter attack from the Axis.  I think someone was Frapsing, i'll see if they posted a video anywhere.

I'm back in town for a few days.
Interesting you brought up Frapsing, since this latest patch is MUCH more video friendly.  Things just look better and more exciting.

Yeah, I know some people have said that 1.31 looks like shit, and yeah, it isn't Bad Company 2, ok.  But it feels/looks/sounds great and really sets the scene nicely.

Downloading now. First try went to the end and then 'failed'...hopefully just an anomaly. 2 minutes and change and I will know, I guess  :oh_i_see:

Yep, downloaded, cracked into my account (couldn't remember my user name), and re-subbed for a month. In game handle is guido9tn...someone look me up and tell me wtf I should be doing =)

I'll look for you tomorrow, I am zhenya in game.

Many KIAs later, and I still haven't seen an enemy infantry yet. This fucking blow. Walk for 20 mins and die. Yay.

Yeah, that was roughly my first 3-4 days of the game as well, and it still happens now and again.  You can't play like you would play a normal shooter.  Also, you shouldn't need to walk for 20 minutes, it sounds like you might be spawning it at a forward base instead of joining a mission with a mobile spawn set up.

You have to find the fun  :drill:

WWIIO is more simulation, than game.

Which is why I'm playing world of tanks, has the sim parts I want with none of the sim parts I hate, though a dash of mmo'ness i can barely stand but hey good game other wise.

Hey look, DLRiley thinks he is clever.

Part of the problem is that everyone was crying for infantry, but no one wanted to transport me. Every truck I got into bitched because they were too busy doing ammo runs to transport me, and the rest just drove past as a I walked. And walked. And walked.

I will dig around in the wiki today and get myself more up to speed. Pretty offputting first experience though. If I was new and had no idea what else the game offered I would be pretty annoyed about spending the money.

Yeah, trucks aren't generally used for transporting infantry anymore except in really specific circumstances.  Instead, you can use trucks to set up Mobile spawns closer to the action.  When you are selecting a mission, there will be a little truck and arrow icon on the right side of the mission selection box if there is a mobile spawn set up for that mission, so you should look for that, as it will allow you to spawn much closer than at a forward base.  If you don't see any Mobile Spawns up, there is probably someone on the way to set one up and you can wait for it to deploy and then spawn in.  In the mean time you can always spawn in and defend the forward base for a few minutes as infantry or an AA gun.  Then when you see the "mobile spawn deployed for this mission" in the chat box, you can return to base (press escape), and spawn in nearer the front.

 Also, keep an eye on chat, people will often announce that they've deployed an MSP in the following format "MSP up for (Town we're fighting in) 1 Regiment / 27th Infantry /their_name", which means you can find their mission from the brigade selection list by going to 1rst regiment, 27th infantry division, and then finding their name on the missions list.

Ah- I was wondering what the hell MSP meant =)

I was funneled into a BKB squad when I started and was trying to spawn into the same missions as them. Is there a better way to do it? Is going to the strat map and looking for action spots more reliable?

I tried using an AA gun last night but couldn't get it to actually fire. Drug out a few hundred meters, deployed it, but couldn't actually fire it. Either I can't remember anything, or things have really changed since I last played. Probably a bit of both.

You'll have to switch to the gunner to fire :).   You default to the commander position, so after you've deployed the gun, switch to the gunner position (using the number keys), I think 1 is commander and 2 is gunner, or vice versa, I'm blanking on it.

Using the map is a good way to find the action for sure.  Once you've chosen your persona you can look at the map and you should look for a few things in particular:

1) If the border around a town's name is red and blinking, that means there is an attack order on that town, its a good bet there is something going on there, though it might not be the most populated of all the towns.  You can use this to get a quick overview.

2) If the background behind a towns name is a green or red color (it looks obviously different than the rest), then the town is currently contested, meaning at least one capture point in the town has been taken by the other side.  There is a good chance things are going on here unless it is a softcap (but don't worry about that for now).

3) Under the town's name there will be a little guy and a little tank if there are infantry and armor near the town.  If it is black with a red outline that means there have been enemies spotted near by, but not in large numbers.  If it is solid red, that means there are large number of enemies here.   In chat you will see these referred to like so "Town X is EWS double/double" (meaning both infantry and armor enmies are around in big numbers, single/single if smaller numbers, single/double, double/single, you get the idea).  EWS = Early Warning System.

4) You can always ask in side chat "What is p1" (priority  one).   You'll get an answer like "p1 attack Town X, p1 defense Town Y" those are the towns where most of the action is going to be happening.


Other random map information:  You can see how many brigades are stationed in a town by looking at the number of dots next to the flag showing which country owns that town.  You can turn on radar to see air traffic.  yellow = some air spotted in this area, red = lots of air spotted in this area, useful if you are wanting to play air, or play anti-air.   You can use the magnifying glass icon to search for a specific town if you are having trouble finding a town someone mentioned in chat.  If you put in the first few letters and search, that'll do the trick.

If you have other questions feel free to ask.

Haha yeah I found the AA guide on the wiki and discovered the gunner secret  :grin:

Thanks for the map info- that should prove helpful. I will probably try to get some time in this afternoon...this pesky 'work' part of working from home is buggering up my gaming time today.

Just a couple screenshots of 13th Inf in action, and examples of why this game is worth playing :)

 :oh_i_see:

You are on thin ice. Stop fucking trolling.

DLRiley, if you aren't going to contribute in a positive way stop posting.

Paradrops arent as prevalent as they used to be since the advent of the MSP.  I remember some multi transport drops of damned near 100+ inf... complete with fighter escorts, etc.
(sigh)
This is one game I wish would go F2P.  Seriously, it needs 10 times the population to really show off its wares.  It's fine the way it is mind you, but just a shadow of its former epicness.

There is an easy way to fix that, make basic infantry types free to play.  The infantry ratio to other unit types would be accurate and they would get some new subscribers who don't want to be second-class citizens.

If they did indeed go F2P they'd have to also go back to their prior attack and supply models.  The reasoning behind the CURRENT model was to funnel the population to smaller AOs (because the population became... small).  Bring in more peeps and they'll have to open up the lines a bit like they used to (maybe even do away with MSP) which would involve undoing a helluva lotta code.  But hmmm, I 'spose they could just give the HC's more attack orders and such.  Might not be too difficult to do actually.

Number of possible attack orders already scales with population I believe, so that shouldn't be a problem from a coding perspective.  My worry is more than huge amounts of inconsistent players wouldn't really make the game all that much better. While it would certainly increase the sheer number of troops on the ground, I'm not especially sure the over all experience would actually be better if there were simply a couple thousand more people on the server.  The scale in any given battle feels pretty decent right now, and while the MSPs do, to a certain extent trivialize some of the organization needed that gave it some of that old epic feel, I'm not sure going back to that model would recapture the magic in itself.   I think the game would do better with a bigger playerbase, no doubt about it, but at the same time, I think what they have right now works really well for how the game has evolved, and trying to re-jigger everything again might end up with a mess.   

There are still big epic ops and battles to be had, I've been on para drops with over 100 people with escorts and all under the new ruleset for sure, and in fact just last week there was an truly epic op in Aachen in which 8 or so squads pooling together around 150 people pulled of a simultaneous capture of all 4 army bases in the city at once.  That op was all ground based too, no para drop even needed.  Paradrops are generally less useful than they used to be of course, no doubt, but I still see 1 or 2 sizeable drops a night (30+ people), and at least once a week you'll those real huge ones.  They aren't strictly speaking necessary all the time now, but when well timed they are effective, and everyone loves to go on those ops because they just feel awesome.  Even if you are one of the unlucky paratroopers than gets shot on the way down by AA, you still leave with a great story to tell.

Anyway, I guess my point is, while it isn't quite the same as it used to be, there are still some real great moments to be had, and I personally think they rival the old moments, though I'll freely admit they are probably not as frequent.


Also, on another note, Campaign 62 is going to end any time now, the allies have captured all the Axis factory towns.  I wonder what CRS has in store for intemission this time around.

Finally got in on a good attack with lots of EI and a nice close MSP... died a bunch, but got a few kills too. Good times.

Here is a video from that huge op we pulled at Aachen last week.  You don't really get the scale of it from this small clip because we spent nearly an hour setting everything up before the video you see here kicks in, including about 20 minutes where each of the teams had already infiltrated the city, but had to evade German tanks and infantry to avoid being noticed and blowing the whole plan.

Basically, what you see here is one of four teams which has infiltrated the city of Aachen and waited while we faked the germans into thinking the attack was a diversion from our real attack (by hiding our numbers).  After the 1 Capture point we owned in the city had been held for 10 minutes and thus the Army Bases become available for capture, our teams moved out (one of which you see in the video) 3 within the city, and 1 the airfield to catch the Germans offguard by simultaneously capturing each Army Base and denying them the ability to spawn into the city.

I am zhenya in the video.

EDIT: warning, the music is kind of loud, might want to turn down your volume.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYmmQBGkddQ


EDIT 2:  ALLIEs VICTORIOUS IN CAMPAIGN 62!
First campaign in the post 1.31 era goes to the allies :).  

Intermission underway, so nows the time to screw around .  Campaign 63 to begin thursday (maybe friday).

Was just in on the capture of Aarschot. Infantry play is coming back to me slowly but surely, so I only die with zero kills 2 out of 3 spawns now  :grin: It is starting to be fun again.

:grin:

Yeah, the learning curve, or relearning curve as it were, is pretty tough, but staying with it past the first week or two pays off big time.

Tempting.  So the action is pretty good, key is in finding it?

Finding it isn't hard if you play during European/American prime time, but if you are on the other side of the world, its a bit more difficult because population is less during your probable prime times.   Learning the map and how to decipher what people are saying in chat to find the action might take a few days or so, but once you're past that learning curve its pretty easy to jump in.

Tweak to supply mechanics:


Should please some of you folks who played the game first time around and liked the supply mechanics better then (as we talked about earlier in the thread even)

I theorize they're getting more subs these days so the old-school mechanics are somewhat more viable again.  Re-sup and ambushes were HUGE originally... entire brigades were formed just for those tasks.  Nice to see they're at least trying to bring it back a bit.  However, it only works when enough people are playing otherwise there's no way in hell you can even hope to keep up with the attrition let alone spare the resources to run an ambush.

They've kinda addressed this by reducing the brigade supply, forcing some re-sup missions really.  Dunno if I like that 'cause it spreads out the war a bit more than I think the game can handle, unless they do indeed have the player numbers.

To give you newbs an idea of what this is, typically when running ANY op where resistance is expected you pre-strategize your resupply brigades to bring in a constant flow of equipment into towns you're attacking from.  Conversely, defending towns run their own resupply chain to combat their losses.  SOOOO, squads used to be assigned to run the supplies (the Quartermaster squad for instance) to the towns.  Now, you might think this is boring, but it's good work for someone new to the game who's not quite sure how to handle some of this expensive equipment.  Also, it can get quite hair-raising when you're bringing supplies into the heart of a firefight.  Aside from this, squads always were assigned supply-CUT missions at obvious chokepoints.  Basically search and destroy patrols.  Usually done with fast attack tanks and/or via fighter-bombers.  So supply people always had to dodge those, many times creating the need for an air escort to keep a look out and kill any incoming air with hopes of taking you out.  A stealth 88 placed behind the llines in a supply route is a deadly move if not caught in time for instance.

It's a funny game of cat and mouse.  Many times it'll go two towns back so you dont deplete the second line... i.e. if u deplete your resup. town too much u can get rolled and lose 2 towns at once, etc.  Good times.

This is key. Once I figured out how to understand all the chatter and then how to navigate through the spawning system to find what I need, it got a lot easier. I am still dying way more often than I would like, but I am learning. I was always better on defense (when I played originally, the Allies were always getting rolled, so I played A LOT of defense*), and I haven't had too many chances lately- Allies are really bringing it.

*My best WWIIOL infantry deployment/mission came on defense. This was back when you could 'climb' trees by going prone and wiggling against them. Town I was defending was the target of a big offensive, and I was there right when it started. Got up high in a tree on the outskirts of town, right along the road. And proceeded to kill infantry. It was like a 2 hour spawn and I got 54 kills before a tank finally figured out where I was and ended me.

I'm working in D.C. these days, so my rig isnt with me.  Gonna build another this week hopefully and start playing again.

So, during the last campaign there was a big long battle over Nettersheim, and one of the rats (devs), was there filming the whole thing unbeknownst to the playerbase of course.

The result is this quite long video featuring the battle: (Its like an hour long if you watch the whole thing which I don't expect people to do, but its in 10 minute chunks)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XEhclVVPIE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdjE5cUwQBU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UzgMPxEUK9E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFPUKm-HlkE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_CLGx9AbNI

Tried my hand at flying today...did the tutorial last night, and took over for real today. I wish I could get good at it, because it seems like a LOT of fun. The controls feel really muddy though- I can't tell if it is my antiquated Saitek Cyborg 3D Gold, the game, or some combination of the two. I fired a few shots in anger, got shot down by a plane, and AA gun, and also managed to auger myself halfway to the core of the earth. I then figured I would do less damage to the Allies if I stayed on the ground for a bit  :ye_gods:

I've usually been happy just to be able to fly without failing horribly let along actually shooting anything :-D

I'm mostly a ground pounder anyway.

Flying is no joke.  Many have said that WW2O is worth the box sale JUST for the flying portion.  The reality is, aside from Falcon4.0, you'll get no better a wartime air sim than WW2O.
I was a pretty good pilot in my time, but I was a sim phreak and real pilot to boot....  and even then, it was tough.  For a newb it's extremely frustrating because you're left with low-lvl gear that can get you killed.  The trick is to identify when you're outgunned and leave.  Also, pick easy missions and targets - shoot some ATGs or tanks or some hapless infantry.  In that respect, it's always better to play a fighter-bomber than to just jump right into a Spitfire.  Popping your cherry with a Blen is the best thing imo.

Get good with bombing and run some strat. missions even, take out some factories, etc.  When you can run one down the pickle barrel, start splitting some destroyers in two.  Get a kill and go home in one piece.  Once you get the ranking then start bringing out the high level fighters... run some CAS for your squad at first, then start gettin into CAP and escort stuff.

I started up in WWIIOL at launch for this reason (came from warbirds before that air warrior). Something learned along the way was you really need pedals. Nothing even twisty sticks like the sidewinder could reproduce good rudder control.

How does it compare to IL-2 Sturmovik? I ask because I have to be skeptical of a game that has a "sub-game" that's allegedly better than a stand-alone WW2 flight sim that's been developed and revised for the last 10 years.

It's apples to oranges.  You're comparing something with a (sandbox) persistent MP campaign to a single-player experience with some MP skirmishes.  This is why I said the only thing comparable was Falcon4.0 (post-patches), assuming you're in bed with guys from SimHQ or some such who run hardcore 24-7 servers.  And granted, you're largely fighting against AI anyways.

As a standalone vanilla experience though, obviously Il-2 will be better in a graphical and flight model sim-sense.  But, for an overarching simulation including deep strat., HUMAN intelligence, sudden changes in plan, scrambles, and so on that actually are meaningful... you need something like WW2O.

Why these are the only games that offer this type of play is beyond me.  (scratching head)  Perhaps I'm forgetting something.
Anyways, flying for the RAF or Luft can be the "deepest" flightsim experience you'll get from any game, bar none...  if not for the simple fact everything you do has a helluva lot of importance rather than most sims where you just feel like you're messing around in a virtual cockpit for fun.

I will recommend also though that if you play WW2O and fly that you get a TrackIR or some such headtracker.  It seriously opens up the game, just as with most sims.  But more important here simply because there are no "expected" encounters, that is you dont just go from point (a) to point (b) and expect "x" amount of resistance at point (b) as in a vanilla flight sim.  In WW2O, vision is everything because there's no limit to where or when you can get into some shit.  Also, spotting ground targets is extremely important and much easier to do with a headtracker.

In closing, taking part in the Air Quake that occurs on large weekend ops will make you shit your pants.  Comms are most heated and chaotic on RAF/Luft channels.  And if you dont own the air you cant win unless you've got advanced placement of large amounts of AAA (which we've done before, and is quite entertaining).

Note, all of what I say is mostly based on play from 5+ years ago.  It's by no means as hardcore nowadays, but still fun.

I've been having a few good nights lately since my new system was built up here in my new work location.  In one weeknight:
1)  Ran FB defense mostly with a single panhard and myself as inf. cover - killed a shitload just working together; planes even
2)  Fired up a Fairmile for the same FB to take care of the air in the area (got a few stu an 09 kills).  Helluva lotta fun there.
3)  After FB secured moved north to do a blitz paradrop with 12 guys on a new AO.  Took the whole town in like 10 mins.
4)  With the same paras, popped smoke in an open area so the transport could pick us up for the next op, which was Oostmalle I believe; we landed right in the hotzone since our chutes were spent; comrades "splatted" after ditching too soon but I waited till the plane was on fire, hopped out and killed 3 tanks with the same ATR-para I had an hour+ earlier.
4.5)  Died and repositioned with AAA/ATG well placed with good trucking teamwork.  Got a bunch of big kills with a simple bofors.  Our flak trap was so deep we had to do ammo runs to keep the guns firing.  EA was like gnats.
5)  Died and shifted AOs (once the axis were busy with Oost) with another dozen guys and speed capped Breda.. layin smoke and mortars with a smart resup. truck.  Axis seemed to lay over once we got the west AB.  Two reasons we got the town the way we did.  a)  The hauler I was with got minimum distance to ALL the ABs and layed the mobile spawn  b)  we layed a para and supply cut east of town and obliterated a few defensive paradrops with aaa/atg.   Combined with the heavy screening action in Oost, we took a major town with ease.

After all this I was fuckin exhausted.  Also was bouncing between multiple TS channels, some airborne, some RAF, etc.  Interesting vibes on each.  Mostly rolled with "buckeyes" from the 13th, but I highly recommend shifting channels as needed since populations definitely arent what they used to be.  Good times.  And this is all just really screwing around - not really gettin serious.

Axis pretty much rolled over after my last post it seems.  Allied victory the other day.  Map has just reset if anyone is interested in getting onto a fresh start.  The beginning of a campaign is extremely different than its end.  Furthermore, every mistake you have early-game has much more meaning than near the end when the opposition has low morale.

I think this is the most recent WW2O thread, not sure. 

Anyway, got this in my mailbox today:

Source: http://www.battlegroundeurope.com/index.php/component/content/article/17-development-notes/9390-10th-anniversary-announcement-wwii-online-adds-us-forces

I know there are only a few people who give a hoot about this game these days, but a friend of mine up and resubbed today, so I might head back into the battle next month when I get some more free time to play again.  If I do I'll be sure to report back.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qgSjjQi4uaw

The Rats have impeccable timing- making their big announcement the same day as E3 - great idea so no one notices the US finally shows up, even if it is a small shoebox sized map that reminds me of Return to Castle Wolfenstien. We Need An Engineer. They missed a oppotunity to add the Cable Car map though  - I always liked that RTCW map.

The Beach map will be interesting in a wow-Omaha-really-was-a-bloodbath for the American's if they follow their promise of making it historical.

Give it another year and they might be able to add them to the main map.

Not sure this is the way to go with this title. Only thing it had going for it was large scale battle.

I tend to agree.  The only thing I can see this doing it taking people off the battlefield and making the game feel even less populated.  Maybe the interest it generates will get some subscriptions back up (which may work for me even), but it feels like they could accomplish that other ways as well.

Well, i was more thinking, they are now up versus traditional FPS games, and they will loose.

I don't know, the big battlefield still exists, this is just a thing you can do as a distraction.  I don't feel like it really is an attempt to compete with battlefield or call of duty.  They've been doing scenarios like this during intermission between campaigns for years in a bit more of a contrived form, this is just making is just sort of building it in.

Better tighten up (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shYv2E9Ek4Q).

It sounds like World of Tanks.  Figures, it only took a decade for CRS to get the US in their game.  Perhaps in another decade they might actually find a way to create different campaign than France 1940 over, and over, and over again.

 :Love_Letters: